Parable: The King and the Scratched Diamond

Once there was a king, who had a beautiful, large pure diamond.  There was no other diamond like it in the world.   One day, it became deeply scratched.  The king called his best diamond cutters, “I’ll promise you a great reward if you can remove the imperfection from my jewel.”  But they could not.  The king was very upset.

Many months later, a man came to the king.  He promised to make the diamond even more beautiful than it ever had been.  Impressed by the man’s confidence, the king consented.  He watched as the man engraved an exquisite rosebud around the blemish and used the scratch to make its stem.

–A parable of the Preacher of Dubno from Jewish folklore.

This story can easily be equated to birth defects.  Even though a child with a birth defect may not appear to be perfect, he/she still has great abilities and opportunities to apply himself/herself in life.  Rather than emphasizing the problem, we must focus on the abilities of the person.